Christie-led RGA hits record haul

The Republican Governors Association said Tuesday that it set a monthly fundraising record in January, a $6 million haul that comes despite the traffic-scandal troubles of its chairman, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.

The announcement is unusual for the RGA — the group typically releases its fundraising results less frequently — and it is a show of strength for Christie the same day he visits Chicago for a fundraising swing.

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The association raised the $6 million in January “with the help of Chairman Christie and all of our Republican governors,” RGA communications director Gail Gitcho said in a statement.

That’s more than twice the group’s fundraising in any previous January, including the last midterm cycle in 2010, according to Gitcho. This month, Christie already has raised $1.5 million from a swing through Texas, Gitcho said.

Christie, a potential 2016 presidential contender, has been battered by allegations that some of his aides and allies engineered traffic jams near the George Washington Bridge as part of political vendetta against a Democratic mayor. The governor has denied any personal role in the alleged plot and says his administration is taking steps to cooperate with multiple inquiries into it.

Nonetheless, Christie’s political future and RGA leadership have come under heightened scrutiny as a result.

The Democratic National Committee is countering his Chicago events on Tuesday with a press conference featuring former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland. On Monday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” — typically friendly territory for Christie — Republican host and POLITICO contributor Joe Scarborough said Christie has become “a distraction to the RGA” who “needs to sit down and do some soul-searching to see whether he wants to defend charges against him or continue this.”

Christie’s schedule Tuesday features an open-press lunch at the Economic Club of Chicago, plus private RGA events including a fundraising dinner. Back in New Jersey on Thursday, he’ll hold his first town hall-style event since his November reelection.